Major information sites suspended in Russia over ‘bribery instructions’

A state-run internet provider in a central Russian region has blocked two leading media web-sites after a court ruled that they were publishing instructions on how to offer bribes to civil servants.

Popular Russian internet daily Gazeta.ru reported on Tuesday that
access to its web-site had been blocked by Rostelecom in central
Russia’s Ulyanovsk Region.

Rostelecom replied to the newspaper’s enquiry that it had limited
the access to 15 internet resources, including Gazeta.ru and
web-site of another popular newspaper - Komsomolskaya Pravda
after a district court in Ulyanonsk ruled that these sites were
distributing materials that “promoted bribery and undermined the
authority of the state power”. The case was instigated by local
prosecutors who demanded action citing the Law on Information
that allows to selectively block internet content “in order to
protect the basics of the constitutional state, morals, rights
and lawful interests of third persons as well as the protection
of national defense and security potential”.

Prosecutors claimed that they had discovered information on ways
to give bribes and on conditions under which bribing is necessary
as well as advice on various ways to evade responsibility for
this crime. However, neither the prosecutors’ lawsuit nor the
court verdict contained precise links to the content in question.

Both Gazeta.ru and Komsomolskaya Pravda said they were unaware of
the hearings and of the verdict and learned about the blocking
from their readers.

Some of the readers who reported the problems said they had to
change their internet provider to continue reading their favorite
news sites. Apparently, other ISPs in the region did not heed the
court decision.

After the story broke Ulyanovsk prosecutors said they were
surprised that the provider blocked the resource as a whole
instead of only blocking the pages with violating materials. They
also added “the screen shots of all materials had been made in
the witnesses’ presence and passed to the judge”.

In turn, Rostelecom told Gazeta.ru that it could only block the
web-site as a whole. A company representative also expressed
bewilderment over the fact that in this and similar cases
prosecutors targeted Rostelecom and completely ignored other
internet providers.

Rostelecom covers about 39 percent of the internet services
market in Ulyanovsk Region.

Gazeta.ru lawyers said in a statement that their daily never
breached any law, saw no reasons for content blocking and did not
exclude that they would appeal the court decision.

Gazeta.ru is one of the most popular news sites in Russia with
about 10 million visitors monthly. Komsomolskaya Pravda is the
heir of the superpopular Soviet-era newspaper with about 18
million monthly visitors.